Snow cuts short opening day of Fuji Super Formula test

Just 14 runners of the 21 runners ventured out of the pitlane during Tuesday's morning session, which had already been cut from two hours to 90 minutes due to a poor weather forecast.

With the promised rain duly soaking the track, it was Nakajima Racing's Toshiki Oyu that set the pace more or less throughout the session, ultimately posting a best time of 1m43.293s.

That was nearly five seconds up on nearest challenger Ryo Hirakawa (Impul), back in Japan fresh from his appearance in last weekend's FIA World Endurance Championship opener at Sebring.

Oyu also completed the most laps with 19, with reigning champion Tomoki Nojiri (Mugen) and Sho Tsuboi (Inging), third- and fourth-fastest respectively, the only others to break into double figures.

Toshiki Oyu, TCS NAKAJIMA RACING

Photo by: Masahide Kamio

The session was stopped three times, the first coming within the opening 10 minutes as Rookie Racing's Kazuya Oshima suffered a crash at 300R, damaging his rear wing. The latter two were both caused by TOM'S man Giuliano Alesi going off twice in quick succession later in the session.

By the time of the final stoppage, the rain had turned into snow, with few cars venturing out of the pits as the session wound down towards its conclusion.

With the snow showing no signs of abating, it was announced shortly after the conclusion of the morning's running that the afternoon session, scheduled to start at 2.40pm local time, had been cancelled.

Super Formula pre-season testing concludes on Wednesday at Fuji with two more sessions planned. These are likely to be extended to compensate for the lost running on Tuesday.

The supporting Super Formula Lights series is also slated to kick off a two-day test on Wednesday.

Fuji testing times:

Pos.	Driver	Team/Engine	Morning
1	Toshiki Oyu	Nakajima/Honda	1'43.293
2	Ryo Hirakawa	Impul/Toyota	1'48.040
3	Tomoki Nojiri	Mugen/Honda	1'52.887
4	Sho Tsuboi	Inging/Toyota	1'53.485
5	Naoki Yamamoto	Nakajima/Honda	1'56.489
6	Tadasuke Makino	Dandelion/Honda	1'59.243
7	Sacha Fenestraz	Kondo/Toyota	1'59.473
8	Ukyo Sasahara	Mugen/Honda	2'00.881
9	Kazuya Oshima	Rookie/Toyota	2'01.436
10	Nobuharu Matsushita	B-Max/Honda	2'10.959
11	Atsushi Miyake	Goh/Honda	2'33.316
12	Yuji Kunimoto	KCMG/Toyota	2'53.510
13	Hiroki Otsu	Dandelion/Honda	3'58.307
14	Giuliano Alesi	TOM'S/Toyota	6'12.062